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Limits on the Size of the Executive Bill

Overview

One of the Evil Party's campaign promises was an all-inclusive, enlarged, and byzantine style of government, the result being a Cabinet consisting of well over 60 ministers. The Limits on the Size of the Executive Bill would have, if passed, shrunken the bloated government bureaucracy by 75% and cut 5 Ministerial departments. Unfortunately, strong resistance from prominent leaders of the Evil Party, including President Sargon and Prime Minister Douglas, may have curtailed this effort.

History

Susano (FFF) introduced the bill on August 6, 2008, arguing: “Gentlemen, the current state of affairs is a travesty. Around 60 ministers? A cabinet several times as large as the parliament? This is ridiculous! There must be some order introduced! Both for the sake of efficiency, and also so that positions granted by the President have some merit and reputation again!” Almost immediately, Pkmatrix (YSP) stated he was uncomfortable with the proposed Article I, which called for the Cabinet to be no larger than Parliament, and opposed Article II, which would limit the Vice Presidency to one individual, on the grounds that the existing twin Vice Presidency helped establish a clearer line of succession. He counter-proposed limiting the Cabinet to twice Parliament's size and removing Susano's Article II entirely.

Susano (FFF) conceded Pkmatrix's point on the line of succession, but argued that: “…two vice presidents is not the way to go. Instead there should only be one vice president and additional rules to what happen if he or she is not available, either.” He also opposed Pkmatrix's proposed Article I: “Twice? Mr Matrix, surely you must see that a cabinet that is AS large as parliament is ridiculous already! That in itself already was a compromise!” Pkmatrix (YSP) responded that, rather than cut 5 Ministerial departments - which would be necessary to shrink the Cabinet to the size of Parliament - he would consider supporting a bill which limited the Cabinet to the existing 20 departments.

TheDarkServant (E) agreed with Pkmatrix (YSP) that streamlining Cabinet to the proposed degree might have negative effects and that there was no need to alter the Vice Presidency. He also pointed out that passing such a bill would force the Evil Party to go back on its campaign promises.

LordInsane (E), meanwhile, advised Susano (FFF) to temporarily retract the bill until after the Evil Party fulfills its campaign promise of expanding the size of Parliament. TheDarkServant (E) agreed: “Once the parliament is increased to a suitable size (which will take some debate in itself) we can work out a way to decrease the size of the cabinet with the minimum of promises broken!”

Susano (FFF) refused these counter-proposals: “20 Ministers would still be an executive double as large as the legislative. And that is absurd. Al, tying the succession to specific ministries is nonsense, as of course every President can set up and abolish ministries a she likes (within the regulations of this bill, ideally). But there are other ways - the President could simply establish an order of succession among his cabinet, for example. In any case we do not need two Vice Presidents! As for LordInsane's objection, I must say I find it kind of unnecessary. This bill ties parliament seats and cabinet posts. If there are more seats, the bill would also allow for more cabinet posts.”

LordInsane (E) countered that the bill as proposed would require going through the hassle of deciding which Ministries are worth resurrecting yet again and that it would be more sensible to to first expand Parliament, so that the limits on the Cabinet are decided, and then enacting the limits on the Cabinet: “Quite simply, first having to cut it, and then having it be expanded again, produces, albeit admittedly only for a short while, more inefficiency and bureaucratic disorder, which is precisely the things this Bill is aimed to decrease in the first place!”

Susano (FFF) responded that the President “can have any future re-expansions of the cabinet in mind when he decides what ministries to cut” and that it was no guarantee any Parliament expansion bill would ever be passed. But, he added: “In the name of compromise and parliamentary peace, I can offer my support for the Parliament Expansion Bill, if EVIL votes for this bill.”

As voting began on the bill, it seemed as if it had a decent chance at passage: LordInsane (E), Susano (FFF), TheDarkServant (E), Nekromans (E), and VulcanTrekkie45 (YSP) all voted in favor. This changed, though, when Prime Minister Douglas (E) and Kidblast (YSP) voted against the bill. Shortly afterwards, all votes in favor aside from Susano's were retracted. The bills chances seemed to become even slimmer when President Sargon (E) made his opposition to the bill clear, stating:

“As for the committee posts:

1: I thought I was being kind, generous and doing a favour giving people posts, even to those I didn't need to give one too from other parties.

2. We made a promise in the election. I can hardly go back on it as that would be BREAKING that promise.

3. I encourage all EVIL MPs to vote against the Limits on the Size of the Executive Bill. I also encourage those of my MPs who have voted for it to reconsider their choice of vote. You should realize I've put a LOT of hard work into this and done my best to be fair to everyone. I feel personally hurt that people are complaining about it. And I mean that deadly seriously. Very hurt. What is wrong with people here?? I do you a favour and this is how you treat me!!”

Several MPs, including VulcanTrekkie45 (YSP), requested that voting on the bill be suspended until further discussion took place.

Proposed Text of Legislation

ARTICLE I

Size of the Executive: At no point shall there be more ministers, than members of parliament.

ARTICLE II

The Vice Presidency: At no point shall there ever be more than one Vice President.

ARTICLE III

The Ministers:

Section 1: Every Ministry shall have exactly one leading administrator.

Section 2: Only this leading administrator shall be called minister. There may be no ministers outside ministries, and in each ministry only the leading administrator may be called minister.

Section 3: The President shall have no power to appoint posts within each ministry except the minister him- or herself.

Section 4: Any other post inside the ministry except for the minister shall be appointed by the minister or by appropriate posts inside the ministry.

ARTICLE IV

Parliamentary Veto: Parliament shall have the power the veto appointments of ministers with a 2/3 majority.

ARTICLE V

Application of the Bill:

Section 1: Should at the enactment of this bill the conditions of article I and II not be met, then it is the duty of the President to change cabinet and ministerial posts.

Section 2: Should at the enactment of the bill there be ministries for which no adminsitrative leader is selected according to article III, then it is the duty of the President to appoint them. Only these may continue to be called ministers, according to article III.

Section 3: Should at the enactment of this bill there be positions inside the ministries except the minister, defined as the administrative leader of the ministry, those positions shall be officially considered abolished at the enactment of this bill.

Result

Voting on this bill occurred on August 6, 2008.

Susano (FFF) voted in favor.

LordInsane (E) initially voted to abstain, later changed his vote to in favor, but ultimately changed it back to ABSTAIN.

TheDarkServant (E) initially voted in favor, but later changed his vote to ABSTAIN.

Nekromans (YSP) and VulcanTrekkie45 (YSP) initially voted in favor, but later retracted their votes.

Pkmatrix (YSP), Ran Exilis (E), Gladi (E), Keenir (YSP), 09camaro (E), and Steffen (FFF) did not vote, and thus abstained.

Prime Minister Douglas (E), Kidblast (YSP), Haggis (E), and Demosthenes (E) voted against. President Sargon (E) made his opposition to this bill very clear, making a Presidential veto likely in the event it was ever passed.

Voting ended on August 13, 2008 in accordance with Article III of the Legislative Procedures Act and, having been unable to gain enough support, failed to pass.

See Also

offtopic/limits_on_the_size_of_the_executive_bill.txt · Last modified: 2019/03/29 15:13 by 127.0.0.1

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